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Arun Jaitley, a senior advocate, is presently the Union Finance Minister and the Minister of Corporate Affairs in the Cabinet of India. Representing the Bharatiya Janta Party (BJP) since 1991, Jaitley proved his mettle and got elevated to become a Cabinet Minister in 2000 followed by his appointment as the Minister of Law, Justice and Company Affairs and Shipping. As the leader of Opposition in Rajya Sabha in 2009, he actively took up the cause of Women Reservation Bill. However, even after being with the party for more than three decades, Jaitley never contested a direct election till 2014.

The chief strategist of the NDA government disagreed with PM Modi in 2015 on his idea of allotting reservations on the basis of religion. In 2016, he launched financial schemes such as India Aspiration Fund (IAF) to be set up as a fund under the Small Industries Development Bank of India (SIDBI), in order to boost the start-up ecosystem in the country.

Before the launch of GST on July 1, 2017, Jaitley said that all parties should support the GST roll out decision and be party to launch of massive reform to which they have been themselves privy to.

On February 1, Jaitley presented the Budget 2018, his last full budget before 2019 general elections. More importantly, this is the first post-GST budget.